Albright's Sparrow overcomes serious injury

Everything happened so quickly that night, Jeff Sparrow didn't have time to be afraid.

He didn't understand the severity of his injuries. He didn't fully grasp that he had severed two tendons in his left wrist, a main artery and the ulnar nerve.

He didn't realize that he had lost 50 percent of his blood.

He didn't know how close he had come to dying until waking up inside the Reading Hospital emergency room with a small army of doctors, nurses and others around him.

Then, oddly, Sparrow thought about basketball.

"I had no idea if I was going to be able to play again," he said. "That's what scared me the most. That's all I worried about, playing basketball again. I hoped. That's all I could do."

Sparrow returned to the Albright College basketball team this season after sitting out last season. Even though he still has some numbness in his left hand, he's helped the Lions reach first place in the Commonwealth Conference.

Less than 18 months after his accident, the former Daniel Boone standout is averaging 17 minutes a game as the backup point guard and one of Albright's top defenders. His comeback has served as an inspiration to his teammates, coaches and parents.

"When my husband (Jeff Sr.) and I sit and watch him play, we get choked up," said Suzanne Sparrow, Jeff's mother. "We think, 'Oh, my God, what a miracle,' to see him out there playing like that. I never thought he'd play basketball again. I never said that to him.

"We thought his hand would never fully extend, that it would be like a claw. We're thrilled that he's dribbling a basketball. Anything else that happened after that was icing on the cake."

Jeff Sparrow's parents didn't know what had happened when they got called to the Reading Hospital the night of July 18, 2008.

A couple of hours earlier, Sparrow and some friends were having a party at their rented house near the Albright campus. Sometime during the festivities, Sparrow was locked out of the house as a joke. He banged on a door that had a large window pane.

"I was yelling to the kids who were inside: 'Let me in! Let me in!' " he said. "When I banged on the window, I put both my hands through the glass. When I pulled my hands out, the glass caught my skin.

"When I looked down, I saw the bone (in his left wrist), and it was bright red. When I looked down at my khakis, they were bright red. When I talked, blood squirted everywhere out of my wrist. I was running around. I didn't know what to do."

Fortunately for Sparrow, Tim Powers, one of his friends, calmed him, took a shirt off somebody's back and wrapped his wrist until the ambulance arrived.

"That night at the hospital, after we talked to the doctor, I asked his friends, 'Who's Tim?' " Suzanne Sparrow said. " 'I need to hug you.' His quick thinking saved Jeffrey's life, for sure.

"I went to the house the next day, and it was awful. When I went into the kitchen, it looked like a murder scene on a TV show. There was blood from the ceiling to the floor in the kitchen and into the bathroom. There were still pieces of his skin on the window. It was nasty. It was tough."

Sparrow underwent surgery to re-connect the ulnar nerve and repair the two tendons. He did not need a transfusion. Before he left the hospital five days later, he asked a doctor when he could play basketball again.

"He said, 'Son, you severed a nerve,' " he recalled. "I was naé?ve. 'You're looking at anywhere from 15 to 18 months.' That's when it clicked that it was worse than I thought."

Sparrow, who's right-handed, wore a cast on his left hand, which was then curled. After the cast was removed three months later, his father took him to a fast-food restaurant and handed him a soft drink. Sparrow dropped it.

"It was so cold," he said. "I had no idea it was going to feel like that."

Because the nerves were beginning to grow back, his hand was hypersensitive to cold and heat. He also had trouble doing mundane things such as putting on socks and tying shoes.

Worst of all, he felt sudden shocks in his hand that would last anywhere from five seconds to a minute and cause indescribable pain. He still gets them occasionally.

"There were times when I'd be sitting in class when all of a sudden I would let out a yell," Sparrow said. "My teachers would ask me whether I was OK. Those first four or five months were the worst. I can't tell people how bad they hurt."

Through therapy, he regained full range of motion in his hand and finally received permission to pick up a basketball last spring. But when Albright coach Rick Ferry saw him play last summer, he doubted Sparrow would be ready for the start of practice in October.

"His game wasn't anywhere close to where it needed to be," Ferry said. "Going into the school year, I didn't know whether he'd be able to play this season. He is definitely further along than I would have thought he'd be at this point.

"The strides he's made have been remarkable. He's a tireless worker."

He still has tingly feelings in his left hand from his ring finger to his pinky finger. His hand might never be the same again, but he's happy doing what he loves best.

"My husband and I were worried about him," Suzanne Sparrow said. "We hoped he could handle everything mentally. Sitting out a whole season, I'd thought we'd have to get him counseling. He was so strong, so determined and so brave, he amazed us.

"Basketball has been his love since he was a little boy. He kept saying: 'Mom I'm going to play again. I'm going to prove to them I'm going to do it.' "

Sparrow said his left hand still feels like a club at times. He's struggling with his shot, but he's helping the Lions in many other ways.

"He brings a real element of toughness," Ferry said. "He's a heck of a competitor. You know what you're going to get from him day in and day out. He really defends. He's a communicator. He gives us a nice lift off the bench."

Sparrow's accident, which he called "dumb;" his rehabilitation and therapy; and his one-year absence from basketball have changed him.

"That was my life on the line," he said. "I grew up quickly. Now when I see people acting stupid, I get so nervous because I know how that can turn into something worse.

"You go to college, and you're so naé?ve about everything. Kids want to have fun. After something like this happens, now I know better."